I sent the following observation about the use of theta "passive" forms, and the others that of themselves take those endings to Carl Conrad himself by email, and his response was that he didn't didn't really understand what I was talking about. I suppose that there is no harm posting the same thing here, (so an even greater number of people can have no idea what I'm talking about ).Barry Hofstetter wrote:you are confusing. I often read something you write and wonder what the gehenna you've actually said. You make stuff way too complicated.
On his Ancient Greek voice page, Carl Conrad say the following:
*[The reference is not given on the webpage.]4. The verbal infix -θη-is traditionally or conventionally understood as the morpheme signifying passivity in aorist verb-forms in -θην, θης, θη, θημεν, θητε, θησαν and in future verb-forms in -θήσομαι, θήσῃ, θήσεται, θήμεθα, θήσασθε, θήσονται. It should be noted, however, that the future forms in -θήσομαι, κτλ. are derivative secondarily from aorists in -θην κτλ. that are conjugated with active endings and that are formally identically with non-thematic aorist active voice forms such as ἔβην, ἔστην. Indeed, the so-called “second passives” are clearly older and formally identical with these non-thematic aorist active voice forms, e.g. ἐφάνην “I appeared” (or “I was made to appear”), ἐβλάβην (“I got hurt”). While these forms in -θη-have, as I said above, traditionally or conventionally been deemed as markers for passive forms and meaning, they are essentially intransitive and were never used exclusively to express passive sense but rather to form normally intransitive aorist forms that could represent the aorist for either “middle” verbs (ἠγέρθην “I rose,” aorist of ἐγείρομαι) or “passive” expressions of transitive (causative) active verbs (ἐποιήθη “was created,” aorist of ποιέω). While in fact the greater part of -θη- forms in ancient Greek do represent passive semantic force because they appear in the aorist- or future-tense forms of transitive causative verbs, nevertheless a very great number of the -θη- forms are simply the intrasitive aorist- or future-tense forms of “middle” verbs as defined in §3 above.
5. Replacement of older aorist middle-passive forms by “passive” θη/η forms: It is important to understand that over the course of time aorist middle-voice forms in -μην. -σο. -το and future middle-voice forms in -σομαι, -σῇ, -σεται came to be supplanted by --θη- forms in -θην, -θης, -θη (aorist) and -θήσομαι, -θήσῃ, -θήσεται (future). This process began early and is already apparent in Classical At http://www.artsci.wustl.edu/~cwconrad/Pics/ic in the verbs that have conventionally and traditionally called “passive deponents.” In the κοινή one may readily recognize this process in alternative forms in the LXX and the Greek NT such as ἀπεκρινάμην = ἀπεκρίθην and ἐγενόμην = ἐγενήθην. This process continued on in the course of the development of Byzantine and later forms of the Greek language. Rutger Allan has shown the distribution of θη forms over the categories of middle usage in the Homeric era and in the Classical era in (sic.)*
In that page, he offers no explanation as to why both forms - traditionally known as middle and passive - co-existed in a system in which there was only two categories - unmarked and explicitly marked as subject-affected.
The theta stem passive forms (and what Carl refers to as "active endings and that are formally identically with non-thematic aorist active voice forms such as ἔβην, ἔστην", and importantly I might add also ἦν) serve a clear function within the system of the vocabulary moieties within the dual and alternating speech styles of Greek. Formulating that succinctly into the 6th or 7th most important rule that appears to have been followed in alternating speech styles, it can be said that:
- The theta "passive" forms (and the other verbs just mentioned) serve to change a second moiety verb for usage in the general or first speech style contexts.
[Barry, in anticipation of what you may be thinking, it is like that some words are issued with a temporary id card or hall-pass, so they can be in the places, where they would usually be restricted from.]